For decades, the gaming industry has been a place where experience counts for almost everything. From Las Vegas to Macau, many industry executives learned the business by working their way through the casino floor, developing an understanding of a property's rhythms, managing employees, hosting guests, handling regulators, and making real-time decisions with real-life consequences.
The gaming industry is undergoing dramatic shifts driven by developments that extend beyond traditional casino operations, including AI, local legislation, international policy, and even foreign relations.
How should gaming leaders prepare for the next phase?
That question is central to the Executive Development Program (EDP), run by the University of Nevada, Reno (UNR) and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). The eight-day program brings senior gaming executives from all over the world to Lake Tahoe. Rather than teaching them how to operate a casino, EDP asks them to step away from their normal responsibilities and consider the larger questions around strategy, leadership, technology, innovation, and what’s changing the industry.
Covers spoke with Jim McClenahan from UNR’s College of Business, who has been a member of the EDP planning team for the last 15 years. He also serves as the program moderator on the UNR side, alongside UNLV’s Dr. Bo Bernhard. McClenahan compared today’s industry challenges to the early days of COVID when executives had no established playbook for a global pandemic and had to build one in real time.
“About a month after the COVID pandemic began, Dr. Bernhard and I hosted Zoom meetings and invited all our EDP alums to attend,” he said. “We held it multiple times per day to accommodate global time zones. People needed a place to vent, a place to grieve, and a place to ask questions. Most of the time, Bo and I had no idea of answers, but our EDP family is among the smartest people in the industry, and they had great ideas.”
“Following this, Bo and I ran EDP Online for two years. It was no less valuable, but it was very different than what the Tahoe experience is set to be, and not only because it is in person and not online,” he added. “The disruptions gaming executives face today are very different. AI, changing regulation, iGaming, and a massive shift in consumer habits are just some of the things that executives have to deal with. And again, there are chapters in the playbook that need to be rewritten or written from scratch.”
Although the EDP facilitates discussion on current trends and events, the program itself is long-established. UNR and UNLV have been operating the program for more than three decades. Since its launch in 1990, EDP has graduated more than 1,700 C-level executives from gaming companies and regulatory agencies worldwide.
The program’s mission is clear: Experience may teach someone how to run a gaming operation, but developing the people who lead a complex industry requires something more.
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How gaming found its way into the classroom
When Dr. Bill Eadington, a longtime faculty member in UNR’s Department of Economics, launched EDP in 1990, he envisioned bringing gaming professionals into the classroom.
Eadington, who joined UNR’s faculty in 1969, had already helped establish commercial gaming as a field of academic study through UNR. His work examined an industry that was rapidly changing and expanding beyond its traditional boundaries, creating new challenges for its leaders.
EDP’s concept is that executive development needs to keep pace with the constantly evolving business. It was never meant to teach operations to people who did not know them. Instead, its participants were already in the industry and brought experience and expertise to the program.
The value of EDP was connecting that experience with management, strategy, and perspectives that executives might not see during their working week. That distinction has remained important even as EDP has evolved.
More than 36 years after its creation, the program continues to bring together professionals from gaming companies and regulatory agencies worldwide. The 2026 program describes that environment as a place to learn, grow, and network with the next generation of industry leaders.
UNR, UNLV bring different views of the same industry
Nevada provides a natural setting for gaming studies, with two universities that have long-standing academic connections to the industry.
At the University of Nevada, Reno, the connection begins with the academic study of gaming. Eadington's work helped establish commercial gaming as a field of research, while the UNR College of Business continues that tradition through gaming economics, academic research, and executive education. At UNLV, the International Gaming Institute sits in the middle of the Las Vegas gaming ecosystem where researchers and faculty have a direct view of an evolving industry.
The two universities bring different academic and industry perspectives, but EDP brings them together. UNR's McClenahan and UNLV's Bernhard serve as moderators for the 2026 program. McClenahan has been a part of EDP's planning team for 15 years and is also interim director of UNR's Institute to Study Gaming and Commercial Gambling.
Bernhard brings a career spanning both universities. He became the inaugural research director of UNLV's International Gaming Institute and later led the institute while also holding the Philip G. Satre Chair at UNR from 2016-2026.
The 2026 program also draws on UNLV faculty and industry experts to expand the academic and practical perspectives available to participants.
“This is a very special joint venture between two very special universities,” UNLV’s Bernhard told Covers. “Our global success in building a brand with EDP's reach and scope demonstrates how powerful it can be when the two universities work together. On this particular topic, one that is special to all Nevadans (the world of tourism-gaming-entertainment, and its exportation), it's just an ideal topic for this collaboration, which has been the most rewarding collaboration of my entire career.”
EDP is not a week of lectures
Bringing experienced executives together for eight days simply to teach them how the gaming industry works would miss the point of EDP. Many participants have already spent years working in the industry and developed expertise of their own. What EDP does is put them into situations where they need to make decisions based on their knowledge.
Participants undergo leadership assessments, work in teams, and tackle a major case study. They face surprise challenges, make strategic decisions, interact with industry executives, and ultimately present their recommendations for feedback.
At the heart of the program is a team competition focusing on developing a strategy for “winning the future” of gaming, an exercise designed to have “real-gaming-world implications.” Teams have to make choices as circumstances change rather than simply show that they understand a management concept.
“The ability to stand in front of a group of highly critical judges and present your ideas is something every leader and every student should experience,” McClenahan said. “It may be the best academic exercise those students have ever participated in to this day. They still gush about it. The EDP spirit is truly the desire to raise others up and help others succeed, no matter who they are.”
“This is the exercise everyone goes home talking about,” Bernhard adds. “And the winners put on the first lines of their LinkedIn profiles. Attendees will get to work alongside teammates from six continents, creating business friendships that last a lifetime. We always say we would put this exercise - and the week more generally - up against anything being done at Harvard, where I'm quite familiar with the educational products.”
EDP treats executive development as something that must be practiced under pressure, not simply taught. For an industry that traditionally takes an experience-first approach, EDP's emphasis on applied leadership provides a different model.
First, learn how you lead
Senior gaming executives spend much of their careers reacting to what is happening around them. It could be how a property performs, what competitors are doing, or how employees and customers behave. EDP begins by flipping it back to the executive.
Early in the week, Jim McClenahan leads a track called “Learning about Your Leadership Skills: Assessment and Applications,” in which participants receive personalized assessments of their leadership strengths and consider how these strengths affect how they work with others and make decisions.
The exercise puts the individual ahead of the business, asking participants to examine their own performance in communication, collaboration, and decision-making. It can also reveal areas where their leadership approach could be strengthened.
Bo Bernhard will deliver a TED-style talk on Science and the Gaming-Hospitality Industry and Fun Economy called “Why Are You Smart.” Bernhard will introduce the week by exploring the science behind gaming, hospitality, and the “fun economy” while connecting those concepts to the program’s broader objectives.
“The fun economy - tourism, sports, and entertainment - now accounts for one in every seven dollars of global economic output,” Bernhard said. “That share has tripled in a single lifetime. It is bigger than pharma, apparel, cars, and agriculture combined. And almost nobody has noticed. Drawing on my new book, 'The Fun Economy,' we explain how this applies to their specific gaming worlds - and also how the rise of the global middle class turned fun into the world's fastest-growing industry, why the three sectors are collapsing into one experience, and who gets priced out of the party. Case studies take us around the world, from Singapore to Las Vegas.”
Learning from people who've run the industry
For executives who already have years of experience in gaming, another academic lecture is unlikely to be enough. EDP addresses that by bringing the industry into the classroom alongside the academics.
The 2026 program includes executives such as Roger Snow, senior VP of products for Shuffle Master, Andrew Burke, CEO of Bluberi and an EDP alumnus, David Lopez, CEO of AGS, Earle G. Hall, CEO of AXES.ai, and Todd Haushalter, chief product officer at iGaming provider Evolution.
Industry guests appear alongside UNLV gaming-management professor Anthony Lucas, Alan Feldman, and Brett Abarbanel from the UNLV International Gaming Institute, hospitality and innovation specialist Robert Rippee, and casino-resort designer Paul Steelman.
The curriculum extends beyond traditional casino management topics. It connects leadership to industry changes, including technology, new products, AI, crisis management, operations, and finance.
This once again shows the central idea of EDP: that the classroom extends beyond theory alone. Academic research can provide insight into problems, but it is the people who run businesses who put that insight into action. It highlights what happens when those theories meet employees, customers, competitors, regulators, and financial pressures.
“Like the rest of the program, success in the case study is measured by far more than operational criteria. For me, it’s about winning the hearts and minds of your team,” McClenahan explained. “There are many talented people who can read a balance sheet or operate a casino floor. But gaming is an industry that is operated by people, and built for people, whether it’s employees or guests. Leadership isn’t purely up to operational skill and knowledge; that’s the starting point. Empathy, understanding, and people skills make you a great leader.”
Teaching the industry that comes next
The gaming industry that EDP was created to serve in 1990 could not have anticipated many of the technologies now on an executive’s agenda. Generative AI, mobile gaming, increasingly sophisticated analytics, and data-driven personalization have changed how gaming companies develop products, understand customers, and make decisions.
EDP's curriculum has evolved in response to industry challenges. The 2026 program includes a session titled “What Do I Need to Know About AI?,” while Todd Haushalter's “Game of Games” examines the future of gambling products. Rippee brings perspective from his work in gaming properties and innovation, examining how casinos can become environments for testing new ideas.
Other sessions throughout the week include digital transformation, customer behavior, regulation, and emerging gaming products. This range of subjects is important because it reflects the challenges executives face, even if they are experts in one area of the business.
For a program now more than three decades old, continuing education is not just about providing new information. It is more about showing the reality of gaming leadership, where what an executive learned five years ago may no longer reflect where the industry is today.
The case study is where classroom meets casino
The clearest indication that EDP teaches leadership rather than simply discussing it comes in the case study that runs through much of the week.
Participants are divided into teams and given a strategic challenge that requires more than just identifying the right answer. They must assess the problem, develop a plan, allocate resources, and decide how to respond as a group. With executives arriving from different companies and professional backgrounds, the process also forces them to negotiate competing views.
The work builds toward a final presentation before a panel of judges, where teams defend their recommendations and compete for an award recognizing the strongest case-study submission. An earlier surprise team challenge adds another test, asking participants to respond without the sort of preparation available for the main case.
Why Lake Tahoe matters
The 2026 program runs November 7-14 at the Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe Resort, Spa & Casino. The setting removes participants from their offices and day-to-day responsibilities, giving them more time to interact with one another.
A session called “Show Us Your House” asks participants to explain where they come from and the challenges they face, with the aim of identifying shared challenges and ideas among executives. The setting serves a practical purpose beyond removing executives from their routines. It changes who they spend time with and how they interact.
Building a network, not just a resume
The relationships formed at EDP help differentiate the program from a conventional executive course. Participants spend eight days working alongside people from different parts of the gaming industry, rather than simply attending sessions together.
They share meals, compete on teams, debate strategic problems, and interact with faculty and industry speakers. The intended results are professional networks built through interaction rather than the exchange of business cards at the end of a conference.
Those relationships can extend beyond the week in Tahoe.
From casino experience to executive perspective
Experience remains important, and EDP is not trying to replace it but use it as a starting point.
Executives in the gaming industry usually move in lanes, so their experience may focus on one area. A slots executive may understand gaming products but still needs to handle financial, technology, regulation, and other subjects when making business decisions. A finance executive may have to account for customer experience, innovation, and organizational culture.
EDP aims to broaden executives' perspectives beyond their individual areas of expertise and toward enterprise-wide leadership. In an industry traditionally built on learning by doing, EDP asks experienced executives to consider the entire business from perspectives beyond their primary areas.
Gaming leaders still need a classroom
The casino floor remains an important learning environment for gaming executives, providing experience in operations, employee and customer management, and business performance. But it is not the only type of classroom. EDP adds a formal leadership-development component to that hands-on experience.
As gaming becomes more international, technology-driven, and interconnected, experience in one part of the industry does not necessarily provide all the perspective needed to lead a complex gaming organization. EDP's model is built around giving experienced executives time away from their usual responsibilities to challenge their knowledge, engage with unfamiliar disciplines, and learn alongside people approaching the industry from a different path.
“AI, global trends, and customer preferences are affecting many industries. But the gaming industry also faces its own unique challenges,” McClenahan summarized. “Regulatory compliance, customer perception, and workforce management, to name only a few. At the end of the day, the executives we train are managing a small city. We can’t give them the answers to everything, but we can give them a toolset that will help them make the right, responsible decisions.”
Bernhard added: “EDP is the toughest week you'll ever love. Up in the gorgeous setting of Lake Tahoe, attendees literally and figuratively feel elevated, coming back down the hill with new perspectives, new friends and faculty members from around the world, and often, a new way to look at their professional lives. They come back energized and with cutting-edge ideas that will help transform their careers, and their companies - that's what we promise our industry friends who send attendees every year.”
